Cyclamen’s Hayato Imanishi Cranks Out Eclectic Technical Metal

I had never heard of Tokyo-born musician Hayato Imanishi until he managed to surprise me three times in a single week. His first surprise was to produce the most eclectic technical metal album I’ve heard so far this year. But then I discovered he recorded it in a secluded house in the middle of a forest in Nagano, Japan — and that he did so entirely alone. He was a man I felt compelled to meet.

Imanishi performs under the name Cyclamen, and his debut album — Senjyu — was released late last month. In many ways it feels like an album fighting itself over an inherent split personality: At times it’s brutal, quickly exploring the most inaccessible depths of technical metal, death metal and fusions of their parent genres; yet at times its flowing, atmospheric ambiance could be labelled “Sigur Rós” and nobody would scribble it out, thinking you’d labelled it in error.

It’s a powerful recording, as hard-hitting as it is soothing. Upon first listen, its unpredictable shifts from brutality to tranquility, screams to haunting harmonized falsettos, feel uncomfortably juxtaposed and difficult to appreciate during a single mood. But it’s this contrast that gives the album its unique character. It’s also, I discovered after meeting up with Imanishi, entirely intentional.

“In the album I wanted a quiet side,” he explained. “It’s all about the contrast. If it’s all technical, technical, heavy, heavy, it just becomes one dynamic and people don’t appreciate how heavy or aggressive it is. There are such a wide range [of song styles], I’m really not expecting a person to love all the songs, and it’s not a problem. I wanted to create one really good song that appeals to each person.”

Imanishi is an antisocial character by his own admission, and it evidently led to him writing and recording the album by himself. “I was totally alone in this house in a forest. In the evenings you don’t see anyone walking around your area, except maybe for some monkeys.”

Born in Tokyo, he left Japan at 13 for a boarding school in Shrewsbury, England, until age 18. Following that, he attended University of Warwick to study computer science, which ultimately led to the web-design profession that funded his musical interests. “My life is chaos at the moment,” he explains. “I live a third in England, a third in Thailand and a third in Japan — I don’t really have a proper home.”

Perhaps it’s this divided lifestyle that lead to him write a concept album that explores human emotion in such an interesting way, contrasting such conventionally opposite musical styles and laying them down on record by himself.

Or perhaps it’s coincidence. But either way it’s a compelling listen for fans of Meshuggah, Sikth, The Dillinger Escape Plan, Lamb Of God, Sigur Rós, Hella and Deerhoof — just give it three or four plays in different moods to appreciate its multiple personalities in their own light.